At precisely six-thirty the porter returned. He announced his arrival in
the peculiar manner previously described.
"De taxi is waitin' fo' yo', suh," he whispered.
"Good for you, George. Some snowstorm!"
"It sure is. Yo' can't see yo' hand befo' yo' face. I tol' de cabby t'
take yo' straight t' de Watkins. On'y a sho't ways. De Watkins is
fash'nable an' has a cobbyray--leastwise dey did befo' we got int' dis
wah. Anyhow, dey'll give yo' all de comfo'ts o' home, an' I reckon dey's
whut's achin' yo'."
"The nail on the head, George. But I mustn't miss this train. Remember
that."
"I'll telephone, suh, ef dey makes up any time."
Passenger and porter hurried from the car to the station platform,
crossed two tracks, passed through the waiting-room, thence to the
street, which you could not see across for the curtain of driving snow.
There was a line of taxis at the curb. It appeared that everybody had
deserted the train.
Mathison knew that he had committed a blunder. There was even now a
chance to run back; but stubbornly he faced the direction toward which
he had set his foot. A blunder which, before the night was over, might
become a catastrophe. Well, one thing was certain: they should never lay
hands upon that manila envelope. He would deposit it in the hotel safe.
Once that was done, they could come at him from all directions, if they
cared to. He knew exactly every move he was going to make.
"Boss, I wish I was whah dese bags come f'm. Pineapples an' melons; oh,
boy! Say, I ain't nachelly inquis'tive, but what's in dat cage?"
"A ghost, George, by the name of _Palæornis torquatus_."
"I pass!"
Mathison laughed. "It's a parrakeet, a hop-o'-my-thumb of a bird."
"Talk?"
"Almost as much as you do, George."
The porter grinned and helped stow the luggage inside the cab. Mathison
climbed in and slammed the door. The porter watched the taxicab until
the gray, swirling pall swallowed it up. He pocketed the bill.
"Dey ain't no reason why, but I sure hates t' take dat young man's
money," he mused, remorsefully. "De undah dawg; I s'pose dat's it. W'en
dey don't look like it dey is. What's he done, I wonduh? A parrot! Fust
time I ev' seen a white man tote a parrot. An' he don't look like a
henpeck, neither."
He turned and jogged back to the train.
The taxicabs began to straggle along. The streets were full of ruts and
drifts, and the vehicles looked like giant beetles scurrying.
Gloomy town, thought Mathison, as he peered first from one window then
from the other. Not a cheery, winking electric sign anywhere. Then he
recalled the reason, as explained by the porter. A coal famine had
forced a temporary abandonment of this wonder of American cities.
It was stinging cold, somewhere around zero. He threw the lap-robe over
the cage. Malachi wasn't used to the cold. The shop-windows gleamed like
beaten gold, so thick were they with frost. The cab lurched, staggered,
and skidded.
"Lord! but the smell of clean snow!" He dipped his chin into his collar.
He had been away from this kind of weather so long that it bit in.
Cabs in front and cabs behind. Were they following him? Likely enough.
They would be fools if they didn't. A hot bath and a bed for himself and
a room to rove about in for Malachi. The thing was written, anyhow; and
deep down in his soul he knew that he was going to pull through. Fire,
water, and poison gas.
In about ten minutes the cab came to a halt. The door was opened and a
bellboy grinned hopefully and hospitably. Mathison stepped down from the
cab, gave a dollar to the driver, and reached for Malachi and one of the
kit-bags, leaving the other for the boy. He sprang up the hotel steps,
keenly exhilarated. He felt alive for the first time in days. He swept
on to the desk, planted the kit-bag strategically and ordered a room
with a bath. But as the clerk offered the pen Mathison frowned. He
hadn't planned against the contingency of signing his name to hotel
registers. His slight hesitancy was not noticed by the clerk. Mathison
was not without a fund of dry humor, and a flash of it swept over him at
this moment.
He wrote "Richard Whittington, London." He chuckled inwardly. The name
had popped into his head with one of those freakish rallies of memory;
but presently he was going to regret it.
"Room with bath; number three hundred and twenty. Here, boy! How long do
you expect to be with us, sir?" asked the clerk, perfunctorily.
"Until morning. Train stalled on account of wreck. You have a good
safe?"
"Strong as a bank's."
"Very good. I'll be down shortly with some valuables."
"Bird?"
"A parrakeet."
"That'll be all right. We bar dogs and cats."
The door of the elevator had scarcely closed behind Mathison when a man
walked leisurely over to the desk and inspected the freshly written
signature. He seemed startled for a moment; then he laughed.
"A room, sir?"
"No. I was looking to see if a friend of mine had arrived. He hasn't."
The stranger walked away; he strolled into the bar, looked into the
restaurant, mounted the first flight of stairs and wandered into the
parlor, which was empty and chilly. Next he hailed an elevator and asked
to be let out on the third floor. Here he walked to the end of the
corridor and returned, took the next car down, and went directly into
the street. At the north side of the hotel was an alley. The man stared
speculatively into this, jumped into a waiting taxicab and made off.
Half an hour later a woman entered the hotel parlor, selected a chair by
the corridor wall, and sat down. You might have gone into the parlor and
departed without noticing her.
Meanwhile Mathison set the cage by the radiator, went into the bathroom,
came back and felt of the bed, and smiled at the bellboy.
"This will do nicely. How big a town is this?"
"About seventy thousand, sir."
"What's the name of it?"
The boy grinned. Here was one of those "fresh guys" who were always
springing wheezes like this because they thought the "hops" expected it.
"Petrograd."
Mathison caught the point immediately. "Boy, on my word, I haven't the
least idea what the name of this town is. I'm off the stalled flyer, and
I forgot to ask the porter. I wanted a bed instead of a bunk. Now
shoot."
The boy named the town.
"What have you got in the line of theaters?"
"This is Tuesday," answered the boy.
"I know that. Is there a comic opera or a good burlesque?"
"Are you guying me? Where'd juh come from?"
"The other side of the world."
"I guess that's right. Why, this is showless Tuesday, all east of the
Mississippi. Even little Mary Pickford ain't working to-day. New York,
Boston--it's all the same. Nothing doing. The new law; all the theaters,
movies, billiard-parlors, and bowling-alleys dark."
"Well, I'll be hanged!"
"It's the war, sir," said the boy, soberly. "I'm in the next draft. I
don't want to kill anybody; but if I've got to do it I'm going to learn
how."
Mathison held out his hand. "That's the kind of talk. It's bad, bloody
work, but it's got to be done. Here's a telegram I want sent. Don't
bother bringing back the change. But don't fail to have this wire sent."
"I won't fail, sir."
"Now, I want you to give this order to the waiter."
After a word or two the boy interrupted Mathison. "No meat. Fish,
lobster, oysters, chicken."
"All right; make it chicken, then. And tell him to bring a banana and
some almonds. And mind this particularly. Tell the waiter to knock once
loudly. Make no mistake about that."
"Yes, sir"; but the boy's eyes began to widen perceptibly. Here was a
queer bird.
After the boy had departed Mathison double-locked the door. Then he
liberated Malachi. The bird came out and stood before the door of his
cage indecisively. Then he reached down and whetted his beak on the
carpet.
"_Chup!_" he muttered.
"You little son-of-a-gun!" cried Mathison, delighted. It was the first
time Malachi had spoken since leaving Manila. Mathison stooped and
extended his index finger. By aid of claw and beak, the bird mounted the
living perch and slowly worked his way up the arm. "The little
son-of-a-gun, he's alive again! Malachi, are you cold?"
Malachi grumbled in his own tongue. Mathison approached a curtain, and
the bird at once transferred himself to that, clawing his way up to the
pole, where he began to preen himself. His master watched him for a few
minutes contentedly. Then he looked out of the window. He saw the dim
outlines of a fire-escape. He could also see a cross-section of the
street beyond the alley: clouds of snow, spouts, whirlwinds.
He turned from the window swiftly and tiptoed to the door. Some one had
turned the knob cautiously. Mathison waited patiently, but the knob did
not turn again. Door-knobs--they had a mysterious way of turning in the
night.
There would be no going out this night; so he might as well make
himself comfortable. He turned to the kit-bags. He opened them both,
took a pair of slippers from the top of one and a dressing-gown and
toilet articles from the top of the other. The general contents of both
bags were as neatly and as compactly arranged as a drummer's case; but
always on top there would be pick-ups. By the time he had bathed,
changed, put on the slippers and gown--a heavenly blue silk-brocade such
as aristocratic Chinese wear--the waiter arrived with the dinner. He
announced his arrival by a single knock.
The door was opened in a singular fashion. Mathison kept totally behind
it. An Oriental trick; it gave one the opportunity to strike first, if
it were necessary to strike; moreover, it prevented any one in the hall
or corridor observing the occupant of the room. The moment the waiter
stepped inside the door was closed and double-locked again.
"I shall require no service, waiter. Here's a bill; keep the change for
your tip."
"Thank you, sir."
The lock and the latch were released simultaneously. So adroitly was
this accomplished that the waiter never suspected that he had been
locked in or that he was immediately going to be locked out.
Mathison crossed over to the table, peeled a banana, lopped off a bit,
and jabbed the fork into it. This he took to the parrakeet. Malachi
sidled along the pole solemnly and reached down a coral-red claw.
On going back to the table Mathison felt top-hole in spirit. The
telegram was off. If anything happened they would know where to find
him. After he had finished his dinner he would find a hiding-place for
that manila envelope.
Suddenly he became seized by an ironic whimsy, an impulse which in
normal times he would have analyzed as idiotic. Nevertheless, he
proceeded to materialize it. He searched in his coat-pocket for the
picture of the actress, sliced off the non-essentials, and propped it
against the water carafe. With his hand on his heart he bowed.
"Paper lady, I am at once gratified and deeply chagrined to offer you a
repast so poor. I had planned a club steak; I've been planning it for
six long years, and patriotism compels me to eat chicken--which I
abominate! You are disappointed? I'm sorry. You won't look at me? Very
well. That's not your fault; it's the fault of the fool photographer,
the way he posed you. Crazy? Well, perhaps. But, Lord's truth, I wish I
did know somebody like you. I'm the lonesomest duffer in all this
Godforsaken world!"
So, while he munched his chicken and Malachi his banana, the clerk at
the desk was having his worries.
"A queer bunch got off that stalled train," he said to the manager.
"What's the trouble?"
"First a tanned chap with two bags and a parrot signs his name and beats
it for the elevator as if he were afraid the room would vanish before he
got to it. Another man comes up and looks the book over. He laughs. Then
he walks off. Right away comes a veiled woman who does the same thing.
Only she signs. A coat that would pay next year's taxes, but no hat. She
wants room two hundred and twenty. I ask where her luggage is, and she
says she left it on the train. But she hands me a twenty. I let her have
the key. Then up comes Sanford, of _The Courier_. When he pipes those
two names he yells."
"What's the matter with them?" asked the manager. He was not
particularly interested.
"Why, look at this. Richard Whittington, London. Sanford says there was
only one man ever had that name, and he was Lord Mayor of London five
hundred years ago."
"Oh, pshaw!"
"Wait a minute. Here's the name the woman wrote. Manon Roland. Sanford
says her head was cut off in the French Revolution in 1793. One alone,
all right; but two!"
"So long as they pay the bill and behave themselves there's nothing for
us to do. Perhaps they are celebrities and don't want to be bothered by
reporters."
"A new brand, then. I never saw this kind before. Anyhow, I thought I'd
put you wise."
From afar Mathison heard the shrill, prolonged blast of a railway
whistle. Then a rush of cold air struck him. The paper lady rose
suddenly and began a series of violent spiral whirls toward the door.
Mathison sprang to his feet, turning, his automatic ready. He
remembered now that he had forgotten to examine the window lock.
Through this window came a woman. She stumbled and fell to her knees,
but she got up instantly. She wore no hat. Her hair, like Roman gold,
sparkled with melting snow-flakes. Under this hair was a face which had
the exquisite pallor of Carrara marble. Her eyes were as purple as
Manila Bay after the sunset gun. From her shoulders hung a sable coat
worth a king's ransom.
Mathison's heart gave a great bound; then his brain cleared and his
thoughts became cold and precise. He knew who she was. Beautiful beyond
anything his fertile imagination had conceived of her: warm and fragrant
as a Persian rose. Small wonder that poor old Bob Hallowell had gone to
smash over her. But what did The Yellow Typhoon want of John Mathison?
"You are John Mathison?" she asked, her voice scarcely audible. "Richard
Whittington?"
"Yes." His eyes still marveling over the beauty of her. It was
unbelievable. A wave of poignant regret went over him. The tender
loveliness of a Bouguereau housing the soul of a Salome!
"Then take heed. You are in grave danger. You carry something certain
men want desperately. Don't go into the hall; don't leave your room
under any circumstances to-night. The hall is watched. I dared not come
to your door. They must never know that I have aided you. I had to climb
the fire-escape. I dared not trust the telephone. Hide whatever you have
and hide it well."
It is possible that Mathison presented a unique picture to the woman.
The blue robe fluttered, bulged, and collapsed in the wind. It fell to
his feet, shimmering. But for the color of it--had it been
yellow--Mathison might have posed as a priest of Buddha. His handsome,
bronzed face, the cold impassivity of his eyes and mouth, might have
passed inspection on the platform of the Shwe Dagon pagoda in
Rangoon--if one overlooked the healthy thatch of hair on his head.
She broke the tableau by taking from the pocket of her gray coat a gray
veil which she wound about her head, turban-wise, dropping the edge just
above her lips.
"One word more. I am a creature of impulse. I may regret this whim
shortly. I may even return. I don't know. But if I do, watch out!...
Beware of me!"
She backed to the window, stepped through to the fire-escape and
vanished into the night.